I remember it like it was yesterday. Sitting up in the public gallery of the Ontario legislature, surrounded by allergy moms and wiggling kids, looking over the proceedings as the "House" unanimously passed the first law in North America to protect pupils at risk of anaphylaxis in their schools.

Sara Shannon was there, alternately smiling and tearing up about the new law named for Sabrina, the daughter she tragically lost. So was Cindy Paskey, who'd so tirelessly lobbied and led petitions to get this school law. It was an amazing day - May 16, 2005.

Here's the article I wrote about 5th Anniversary of Sabrina's Law in the current issue of Allergic Living:

Sabrina's Aunt Kathleen Whelan and I are most thankful to Travis, AL's web programmer, for rebuilding the accompanying website feature, which had become unworkable. We are very glad to be able to keep Sabrina's voice with us in the allergy community.

May 2005, we were in the midst of purchasing a home. Dd started school (JK-she was still 3 years old due to her birthdate) in September of that year.

Silly me, this being my first experience with school from the perspective of a parent, I just thought they would comply with legislation.

After much head butting, I came to understand that information takes a while to trickle down. I found that habits were hard to break, lesson plans were recycled each year with little thought to the objects involved. I required each teacher to stop and look at each days lesson plan and consider, is there anything here that is a danger to my students. All the while fully knowing that this teacher did not 'get it". They didn't consider candy to be food, we had to stop saying "she can't eat..." to "she is not to eat, drink, inhale or ingest by indirect meeans (absorbed by the skin) anything which her parents ahve not deemed safe" We changed the rule from, "Just say no" to "remind them of our family rule".

Sabrina's Law gave me the confidence to push for what I needed to keep her safe. I had the law on my side, I was not a hysterical, overly dramatic mother who just wanted her own way.

Although the school system ws not good in 2006, I must say that dd did not require her epipen while at school, only once after being dropped off the school bus. These days, it's so much better. The staff try to think of everything, they are receptive to comments or suggestions, they call when preparing for a lesson plan that involves food/household items or before celebrations.

Most importantly, they recognize dd as a child with allergies and they have a plan in place to deal with it.

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